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My Very Honest Review of — Martha Stewart Crafts Knit & Weave Loom

So as a hand busy work hobby I started looming again. I’ve been doing mostly headbands to keep my baldness warm and well…hidden. I have the basic Knifty Knitter round looms in all the sizes and a couple of knitting boards that I had tried with the help of my husband to make that didn’t quite work the way I wanted them to.

The looms I have worked alright but I really wanted something that was a smaller gauge, So when I saw Martha Stewart’s contribution to loom knitting I said to myself THAT is what you need. No you don’t want this you NEEEED this. I did manage to hold off till my 50% off coupon from Joanns was valid and got it for half price. Which is good because full price was $44 plus tax.

So here is my totally honest review.

First for the pros and cons

Pros:

It’s pretty, it really is, it’s not bright or gaudy like most of the looms.

It has about a zillion different configurations

It comes in a decent little storage box

You can easily weave on it and it comes with a weaving tool.

The book is pretty, it has a few beginners projects and is really very Martha Stewart-ish. It’s also written in several languages which is cool and a good thing if English is your second language.

Cons:

It falls apart while you’re looming unless you don’t pull on your yarn AT ALL. I mean seriously if you like to pull your yarn tight when doing the no wrap method or you tug on your yard at all, you’re going to be dealing with pegs falling out.

Some of the pieces don’t fully join together, what I mean by this is that there were a few pieces in my loom set that weren’t properly machined, there were areas inside them that had defects that caused them not to fit together properly. Which in turn caused the pegs not to fit in properly, which in turn made it so that the whole dang thing could fall apart at any second.

The tools included with the kit sucked. Period, the knitting tool sucked, it was a cheap piece of junk, the crochet hook was a cheap plastic piece of crap…I have to admit it really ticked me off when I opened it up and saw the cheap quality of these items. I mean HELLO the knitting tool is quite important to the whole process and I really really REALLY doubt Martha would be using this thing. I think she would demand a higher quality knitting tool.

The cost. It ends up being around $50 after tax if you don’t have a coupon.

In the end, I sadly took it back to Joanns and got a Tadpole and some yarn. I SO wanted to love this thing. I worked with it for a few hours over a couple of days, telling myself that it would get better, telling myself that maybe the pegs will stay put now that I pushed them in yet again. By the end of it I had a headband that was going to be too big, sore fingers from trying to force the pegs to stay put and a totally bummed out attitude.

I read a lot of blog reviews on this item before I bought it and just about Every. Single. Blogger. Had gotten a free loom from Lion/Martha Stewart/Whoever gives these free things to bloggers. So I feel like that very well may have colored their reviews. I’m not accusing anyone of anything but I know when I get something for free it makes me a little more inclined to feel very generous towards any imperfections.

My totally 100% honest review of the Martha Stewart Crafts Knit & Weave Loom is… don’t buy it. There are other options out there for smaller gauges that I wasn’t aware of before. I’ll be writing about those within the next couple of days so if you’re interested in that follow my blog and you’ll receive an email letting you know when I’ve posted.

Just saw a link to your blog, enjoyed your review…even if I disagree. I love the MS, my pegs come loose sometimes and do pop out but I have not lost anything except a few seconds. I do hate the knitting tool, and use only my KK with the MS.
I really like the weaving and have made several purses.
Now if you lived in FW, TX I could let you borrow (or have) my AIO loom, cannot begin to like it. Sandy

Oh I am so jealous lol. I am dying for an AIO but who knows when I’ll be allowed to get it lol. I may have gotten a defective Martha Stewart loom or hey it just may not be for me! I know tons of people love theirs but wanted to give an honest review of my experience with it. I will say I was pretty sad that it didn’t work out for me, I had such high hopes after reading and reading and reading about it. That may have been part of the disappointment, I built it up too high in my mind!

I hated it also for all the same reasons you did. I went one step further, I took it back and then thought maybe I didn’t give it enough time, so I went back and re-purchased it, same issues, finally took it back for good. I would love to know of other small gauge options if you are referring to if it is something other than the authentic knitting board which does not make round looms. Please do share that information. thank you

Terri Check out Cindiwood looms. Just do a search. She does two different gauges. I’ve also heard good things about Cottage looms on Etsy I’m not sure what types of looms they sell but I know they are a smaller gauge as well.

Anyone have any tips for the single knit on the MS loom? I bought mine years ago and it’s great for double knit or weaving but everytime I try single knit the yarn gets too tight or I have to hold the pegs in and it ends up being too time consuming to even be worth using it. Any input/info would be appreciated! Hopefully someone has figured out this contraption out a bit more……